"WTF?"
That's what several bicyclists in Minneapolis were probably thinking recently as they encountered a fully dressed matador squaring off with them on as they rode down one of the city's many bike paths.
Turns out it was an art project from the Carmichael Collective, which over the past 10 months has created a series of similarly wacky and creative stunts.
"It's all about creativity for creativity's sake," says Dave Damman, the founder of the collective, which is comprised of employees from Carmichael Lynch, an advertising firm based in that city.
Back in May we covered a project called "Bug Memorials" which was one of the collective's first projects and ever since they've been pushing out new ideas as a way to help employees at the firm get their creative juices flowing.
Damman, who is also the chief creative officer for Carmichael Lynch, says that when staffers participate in the collective he doesn't want them worrying about meeting client needs or tailoring projects to reach a specific audience. He just wants them to have fun and think outside the box.
"The mantra for the whole thing is 'What if?'" he says.
Like many of the collective's projects, the idea for the "Bike Matador" just popped into an employee's head one day. Damman says Thako Harris was riding his bike to work and thought about how he might spruce up the commute.
"If he was doing this with cars he probably would have been run over or at least flipped off," Damman says. "But none of the bikers had unfavorable responses."
Other recent projects include the "Censorship Towel," "Piñata Anatomy" and "Urban Plant Tags."
Damman says the Censorship Towel, which mimics the pixelation used to censor nudity, was one of their most popular and is actually going into production soon.
"I think the entire country of Japan wants one and it really struck a chord with 14- to 16-year-old boys," he says.
The Piñata Anatomy project, which uses cleverly placed candy to mimic organs, was timed to coincide with Cinco de Mayo.
"Cinco de Mayo is this day where all these piñatas are killed and we thought it would be a fun look at what's in there before you crack it wide open," Damman says.
Urban Plant Tags draws its inspiration from the signs used to label plants in the ground and came about after an employee saw hordes of people out working in their gardens on a warm spring day.
Damman says the main takeaway for the collective has been that good ideas have a unique way of spreading in the connected, social media world we currently live in. Their projects have been seen by millions of people around the world and it's helped the advertising firm realize that all their campaigns need to be more concerned with good ideas and less concerned with trying to shove a brand or a message down consumer's throats.
"We're not trying to force it," he says. "Because once you put that magic in the bottle it's not magic anymore."
All photos courtesy of Carmichael Lynch
